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June 17, 2005

Strange But True!

By BILL SONES and RICH SONES, Ph.D.
Special to the Journal

Q. "Women are more like each other than men," said Lord Chesterfield (1694-1773). What proof did he offer?

A. What he really demonstrated is our very human tendency to see people in a group (or grouped together by others) as being more uniform than they are, says David G. Myers in "Social Psychology." If you think of an assemblage of people as being all athletes, or truck drivers, or teachers ... this exaggerates the similarities within those groups and the differences between them. "They" seem "all alike" and different from "us," and because we naturally like those who are like us, an "ingroup bias" results.


 
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